A newly-developed smartphone app can now diagnose anemia without even having to take a blood sample

Anemia is a condition that develops when a person’s blood lacks enough healthy red blood cells or haemoglobin. It affects two billion people worldwide and if it is left untreated, it can lead to fatigue, paleness, and cardiac distress.

But now instead of a blood test, biomedical engineers have created an app that can use smartphone photos of someone’s fingernails taken to accurately measure how much haemoglobin is in their blood.

“All other ‘point-of-care’ anemia detection tools require external equipment, and represent trade-offs between invasiveness, cost, and accuracy,” said principal investigator Doctor Wilbur Lam, associate professor of paediatrics at Emory University School of Medicine. “This is a standalone app whose accuracy is on par with currently available point-of-care tests without the need to draw blood.”

*** end quote ***

Wow. This would have been a great help to my now deceased wife who was afflicted with an unknown blood disease that required haemoglobin monitoring.